Good evening everyone! leslierahye here to share with you this fun canvas that I made for my Samantha [aka Fancy Pants] with the beautiful Cheery Lynn Designs Dies and the scrumptious Faber-Castell Gelatos and Aquarelle Watercolor Pencils. We have been redoing the kids' room and the wall just screamed for some initial art! I hope you enjoy my project!
To create your own initial canvas
Assorted Cheery Lynn Doily and Flower Dies
8×10 canvas
empty mister bottles
Water Brushes
gesso
Beacon Fast Finish Decoupage
Beacon 3-in-1
I gathered my supplies and my white hand-crafted flowers and doilies.
Before I got started gluing, I created a pink mist with the Watermelon Gelato. I sliced off some of the creamy Gelato into thin slivers and placed it into a mister bottle. I then added water and used a small stick to stir the mixture--helping to breakdown the Gelato further by mashing the stick against the side of the mister. When I thought it was dissolved enough, I gave the mister a good shake to disperse the color throughout.
Next I printed an outline of the letter "S" using my Publisher program. I choose the
free font Big Top for my design. I sized the letter to about 650 points to fill the canvas. Once printed I tested out the flowers to see if they would fit nicely in the space I had.
Next I trimmed out my initial to make it easy to trace and laid out the entire canvas with the doilies, the "S" and the flowers. Once I liked the positioning, I traced the letter onto the canvas with a pencil.
With Beacon Fast Finish Decoupage I glued my doilies firmly to the canvas and let them dry.
Next I attached my flowers using Beacon 3-in-1. I started with the big flowers first and then added leaves and smaller flowers until I was happy with the placement. I set the canvas aside to dry for a little bit.
It is now time to coat the ENTIRE canvas with gesso! This coating gives the WHOLE canvas the same finish so the different mediums will act similar over the entire surface. This also provides the opportunity to create some "bubbles" with the heat tool and add an extra fun texture. But more on that later!
Now the REAL FUN begins! Get out your Gelatos! I started with Margarita Mix and Snow Cone and colored direct to canvas around the "S" concentrating the Snow Cone color on my doilies.. Next I spritzed water onto the canvas to activate the Gelatos and painted the color until smooth all over the canvas leaving the flowers alone. As the colors around the doilies blended, I added back over the top more of the Snow Cone to make them bluer.
Once I was happy with the background, I picked up the Gelato mister that I created above and sprayed the "S". I added color in layers, drying with my heat tool between layers. I allowed some over spray to stay on the canvas but if it got too thick I simply dabbed it with a dry cloth to pick up the extra.
While drying, I concentrated some heat around the doilies to bubble up the gesso that got stuck in the details of the die cut. I love these little bubbles that remained.
Once dry, I came back to the flowers with yellow and turquoise Faber-Castell Aquarelle pencils. I put yellow on some of the flower centers and yellow and turquoise on the leaves. I activated the watercolor with a water brush leaving the centers with a hint of yellow and the leaves with a hint of green. I finished with the coloring by adding a swipe of the Coconut white Gelato to the centers of the big flowers to bring in a small highlight!
You know I'm not done until I've added a little doodle. As a final touch, I doodled with my Faber-Castell PITT Artist Pen in Black Small in a few areas around the "S". These pens are perfect as they are waterproof India Ink and come in several sizes for your doodling needs!
I hope you enjoyed my project! Thank you for stopping by!
